SECRETARY'S REPORT. 107 



sheep, difficult as it is to eradicate these noxious plants. We 

 should be very cautious as to the seed we sow. As many as 

 700,000 weed seeds have been found in a bushel of grass seed. 

 The honesty of growers and dealers in seed is not proverbial ; 

 if you find those possessing it, " grapple them to thy soul with 

 hooks of steel." 



There is a very great loss or waste in the cultivation of too 

 much land. This remark has been so often made that no one 

 will doubt it, but perhaps tlie assistance of a few figures will 

 render this fact more visible. It is true to an extent much 

 beyond the common opinion, that the cost of a crop per ton or 

 per bushel is diminished as the aggregate per acre is increased, 

 that is to say, a bushel of corn at twenty bushels to the acre, 

 costs more than a bushel at eighty to the acre, and the same 

 holds true of every product of the land. It follows then that 

 the better we cultivate our land, and the larger yield we get of 

 our crops, the cheaper they will be to us, which is the thing to 

 be sought. And it also follows then, that if we have more land 

 under cultivation than we can properly manure and faithfully 

 work, we shall accomplish this purpose by concentrating our 

 labor and our manure upon a portion only of the cultivated 

 land. 



The following facts, prepared from the census statistics by a 

 gentleman formerly occupying a high position in this Common- 

 wealth, are very striking. He says : " In the year 1850, we 

 cultivated two million one hundred and thirty-three thousand 

 four hundred and thirty-six acres, and allowing one acre for 

 twenty bushels of wheat, for fifteen bushels of rye, for sixty 

 bushels of corn, for forty bushels of oats, for one hundred 

 and fifty bushels of potatoes, for thirty bushels of barley, for 

 one and a half tons of hay, for one hundred dollars' worth of 

 garden products, and seven acres for the pasturage of every 

 horse, five for every ox, four for every cow, two acres each 

 for young cattle, one acre for each sheep, and allowing liberally 

 for other crops and uses, the products of that year ought to 

 liave been obtained from one million seven hundred and seventy- 

 two thousand five hundred and eighty-one acres ; showing a 

 loss of the use of three hundred and sixty thousand eight 

 hundred and fifty-five acres, equal to about seventeen per cent, 

 of the land under cultivation." Now the first waste to be 



